Black Sheep (1996)

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General		Extras
Category	Comedy	Main Menu Introduction Main Menu Audio & Animation
Rating
Year Of Production	1996
Running Time	82:53
RSDL / Flipper	RSDL (38:35)	Cast & Crew
Start Up	Language Select Then Menu
Region Coding	4	Directed By	Penelope Spheeris
Studio Distributor	Paramount Home Entertainment	Starring	Chris Farley David Spade Tim Matheson Christine Ebersole Gary Busey
Case	?
RPI	$24.95	Music	William Ross

Video		Audio
Pan & Scan/Full Frame	None	English Dolby Digital 5.1 (448Kb/s) German Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s) French Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s) Italian Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s) Spanish Dolby Digital 2.0 (192Kb/s)
Widescreen Aspect Ratio	1.78:1
16x9 Enhancement
Video Format	576i (PAL)
Original Aspect Ratio	1.85:1	Miscellaneous
Jacket Pictures	No
Subtitles	English English for the Hearing Impaired French German Swedish Danish Norwegian Italian Spanish Dutch Turkish	Smoking	Yes, and not of tobacco
		Annoying Product Placement	No
		Action In or After Credits	No

    One answer springs to mind when I am asked exactly why I volunteered to review the film Black Sheep - the late Gene Siskel stated that it was the first film he walked out on in twenty-six years. When you consider that this man was famous for being an honest film critic, as opposed to the media puppets that grace most of the profession these days, it's hardly an encouraging thought. Having just watched the film in all of its glory, I think the problem was that the film stood too far in the middle of the road with its own mediocrity, not being bad enough to be good, and not being good enough to be watchable. It doesn't help matters that the film's political points are much like the policies of George W. Bush - dumbed down specifically to the level of people who consider Wayans brothers' films to be high art.

    Mike Donnelly (Chris Farley) is a public servant with no ambition, little in the way of goals, and a physique that makes Marlon Brando look svelte - the cruel would call him a loser. His brother, Al (Tim Matheson) is running for the governorship of Washington, a position currently occupied by a woman called Tracy (Christine Ebersole). Mike's inability to do anything without causing disaster is being exploited by both sides of the campaign, so Al sends one of his aides, a man called Steve Dodds (David Spade) to try and minimize the harm that Mike is doing, while Tracy does her best to win the election through Mike's buffoonery. Also appearing in the film is a somewhat mad former soldier by the name of Drake Sab**** (Gary Busey).

    Call me cynical, but I couldn't believe in Al proclaiming his love for his brother in one debate, because Mike is a walking publicity disaster that any sane politician would be keen to distance themselves from. Tracy's political agent (at least that is what I thought he was), Neuschwender (Bruce McGill) was underused in every scene that he appears in, and the political black and white of the film is simplistic at best. I don't think this film is as bad as Gene Siskel would have had us believe, but I still can understand his decision to walk out on it, as there are moments when one is asking if the film is ever going to get funny. Still, if you don't mind low-brow humour and have eighty-two minutes to spare, this film might suit you.

Video

    Black Sheep is presented in the aspect ratio of 1.78:1, and it is 16x9 Enhanced.

    The sharpness of this transfer is impeccable, with a nice, clear view of everything that just happened to be in front of the camera. The shadow detail is very good, although it is not called for very often, and there is no low-level noise.

    The colours in this transfer are bright, vivid, and well-represented, with no colour bleeding or composite artefacts in evidence.

    MPEG artefacts were not found in this transfer. Film-to-video artefacts were occasionally evident, with the lights in a shop that David Spade is hiding in at 10:29 demonstrating the level of aliasing that was the maximum for this transfer. Most of the time, the aliasing was like that on the bleachers at 3:45 - very subtle and easy to overlook. Film artefacts were also found in small amounts, with a large black mark appearing on a sheet to the left of Chris Farley's head at 25:54.

    It seems lately that I am noticing a worrying trend with English for the Hearing Impaired subtitles, in that their accuracy is slipping dramatically. There is one moment at 71:02 when they imply something dramatically different from the spoken dialogue.

    This disc is RSDL formatted, with the layer change taking place between Chapters 9 and 10 at 38:35. This is during a natural fade-to-black, and perfectly acceptable in its placement.

Video Ratings Summary

Sharpness
Shadow Detail
Colour
Grain/Pixelization
Film-To-Video Artefacts
Film Artefacts
Overall

Audio

    A total of five soundtracks are on this DVD. The first, and default, soundtrack is the original English dialogue, recorded in Dolby Digital 5.1 with the higher 448 kilobit per second bitrate. The other four soundtracks are recorded in Dolby Digital 2.0 with surround-encoding, these being dubs in German, French, Italian, and Spanish. I listened to the English dialogue.

    The dialogue is clear and easy to understand at all times, and there are no problems with audio sync.

    The music in this film consists of a few forgettable contemporary numbers, and a score by William Ross, which is equally forgettable since I didn't even notice it was there.

    The surround channels are used in a subtle manner to provide some extra effect to certain scenes, such as the flight of a bat at 23:22, or when it hails at 37:55. These kinds of subtle effects appear throughout the film, and are actually quite pleasant to listen to. They won't exactly impress friends with their immersive quality or their energy, but they do justify the 5.1 formatting, all the same.

    The subwoofer was occasionally used to support some bass-heavy sound effects, such as when a tree falls down at 17:00. It supported the soundtrack without drawing undue attention to itself.

Audio Ratings Summary

Dialogue
Audio Sync
Clicks/Pops/Dropouts
Surround Channel Use
Subwoofer
Overall

Menu

    The menu is mildly animated, accompanied by a Dolby Digital 2.0 stereo soundtrack, and 16x9 Enhanced.

    This DVD appears to be on the "soon to be released" list in Region 1, too. While I haven't found any definitive information about that release, I can see no compelling reason to import it unless the Region 1 version gets something we don't, such as a funnier cut of the film.

    I found that Black Sheep was simply too far in the middle of the road to be particularly memorable - neither bad enough to be good, nor funny enough to make it work as a comedy. I think this, more than anything else, is what has doomed it in the eyes of critics of all kinds, although it won't win any awards for showing an intelligent view of politics any time soon.

    The video transfer is very good.

    The audio transfer is very good.

    There are no extras.

Video
Audio
Extras
Plot
Overall